M OBILISING YOUR E - CONTENT : SCHOLARLY INFORMATION ON THE MOVE Alison McNab De Montfort University #AlisonMcNab

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Collaboration with Ruth Jenkins, Loughborough University E: Input from delegates at UKSG 2012

W HY MOBILE MATTERS There are 5.9 billion global mobile subscribers: 87% of world’s population [International Telecommunications Union] An estimated 1 billion smartphones will be sold in 2014 [Gartner Group] An estimated 10 billion mobile Internet devices by 2016 (with world pop of est 7.3 billion) [Cisco] Horizon Report: 2012 Higher Education Edition –Time-to-Adoption Horizon: One Year or Less: - Mobile Apps / Tablet Computing

W HY IS MOBILISING ACADEMIC CONTENT SO IMPORTANT ? The student experience –Ease of access –Productivity Maximising usage of subscription e-resources Drawing users to your created content

C URATING ACADEMIC MOBILE CONTENT Subcription content –Databases –E-journals –E-books Created content –Institutional repositories –Data –Digitised content –User interaction

P UBLISHER APPS ARE GREAT BUT … Users have to know who publishes the journals they read & download the right app They are often designed for browsing Unlikely to integrate with discovery tools and reference management software May not be available for all platforms Off-campus access can be limited (so not a truly mobile service!)

E-books –Current –Out-of-copyright Podcasts –Consuming podcasts –Creating podcasts / audio feedback RSS feeds Resources (1)

Augmented reality Crowdsourcing Data / Statistics Media / News –Government –Social media curation Resources (2)

Document sharing / Cloud storage Concept (mind) mapping Social Networking QR codes Resources (3)

A SSISTIVE TECHNOLOGY Apple offers “out of the box” accessibility Android devices and apps are catching up Mobile websites: –Responsive design –simpler to navigate –quicker to search (sometimes) Don’t forget –Windows Ease of Access Centre –JISC TechDis Toolbar

T HE CHALLENGES Promoting mobile access while not excluding some users Providing support Identifying suitable mobile content Usage metrics Loss of library-user relationship

T HE LIBRARIANS ’ VIEW M ARCH 2012 No single place lists which publishers have mobile offerings How to make users aware of the mobile sites/apps available Support for large number of interfaces - lack of standardisation. How do you test access problems on multiple devices? Budgets don't extend to purchasing all types of devices let alone ensure these are up to date

T HE LIBRARIANS ’ VIEW M ARCH 2012 Multiple authentication processes, hard to explain to users Off campus authentication Supporting distance learners High student expectations Licensing restrictions

T ECHNICAL ISSUES FOR LIBRARIES How to integrate mobile optimised links in the library catalogue Integration with other systems No way to search across apps Connectivity issues. Not everyone has or can afford 3G and wireless can be unreliable

T HE PUBLISHERS ’ VIEW M ARCH 2012 Cost of development Pace of technology change Whether to create device specific apps… …or mobile websites Providing user friendly tools to allow libraries and users to get the most out of mobile What features to include

O VER TO YOU Design your own App

W HAT NEXT ? More (academic) Apps for Android –But what about Amazon, Blackberry and Windows devices? More websites developed or maximised for mobile access Continued development of mobile e- textbooks

R EFERENCES International Telecommunication Union The World in 2011: ICT Facts and Figures NMC Horizon Report: 2012 Higher Education Edition J. Anderson & L. Rainie The Future of Apps and Web (Pew Internet) –Gartner and Cisco statistics taken from above

ANY QUESTIONS? Thank you for listening Alison McNab #AlisonMcNab